Parents ground him in faith
By Catholic Register Staff
Ante Market can still remember hearing gunshots from his childhood home in a violent Toronto neighbourhood. This didn’t stop him from also hearing the call to the priesthood at the age of seven.Market’s parents and their Croatian heritage, he says, gave him a solid grounding in the faith at a young age. His mother died only three years after his father did, when Market was 18. He says their influence and prayers are why he felt the call to the priesthood.
“(My mother) never shared with me who she was always praying for,” said Market. “I am convinced that the silent prayer of my mother is the reason why, God willing, I will be a priest.”
Because of the death in his family and his financial situation, Market accepted a four-year scholarship from York University with the intention of becoming a family doctor. He didn’t finish his degree, however, because he felt so called to the priesthood that he left his scholarship to study at St. Augustine’s Seminary.
Market, 28, will be ordained for the diocese of Peterborough this spring.
“Hundreds of men who were drawn by our eucharistic Lord have walked this same road ahead of me, and with the grace of God, many men and boys... will also walk this same road after me.”
